RETRO REVIEWS WITH THE PLAID PHANTOM

Greetings, readers of LaserCola.com! I have arrived here to share with you the best and worst of films from the past. My primary task will be to shed light on the dark, murky, and sometimes downright putrid forgotten corners of movie history. In short, a good deal of the movies I’ll be reviewing are the film equivalent to that disgusting puddle or stream of brown and green (depending on which way the light hits it) garbage water that seeps from the dumpster in the back of the mall parking lot.

Don’t get me wrong here by any means folks. These are my guilty pleasures. Cheesy effects. Atrocious acting. Bad Editing. Noticeable ADR. Terrible costumes. Awful music. Mind-numbing dialogue. Films that are extremely dated. I love it all. I truly believe that a film can be so bad that it is good. I also believe that one can be so bad that it goes to good and then back to being bad again. Then you have your films which show a very obvious attempt at being awful with no shame. These are often the most fun of all.

Lo Pan’s Link Dump 08-20-08

Ed. Note: Lo Pan’s Link Dump is a weekly roundup of the latest geek culture headlines, ripped off gathered from various websites and news sources, all brought to you by your favorite 3,000 year old Chinese sorcerer, David Lo Pan!

Look kids, brand new posters for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen! I like the one taken from Optimus Prime’s audition for The Dark Knight. Heh.

Brian Austin Green says he wants to play the Riddler in a sequel to The Dark Knight. Yeah, okay David Silver. I have a better chance of riding on a winged unicorn with a naked Scarlett Johannsen through an enchanted kingdom made of gumdrops and rainbows then you do of even sniffing the door to Christopher Nolan’s office. In a related story, Ian Zeiring stated that he would dress up as Catwoman for a grilled cheese sandwhich.

You know, just as an aside, I really don’t get all this talk of the Riddler as the next Batman villain.  I mean, for the third act, you’re going to follow Batman’s arch nemesis with a second-rate baddie like the Riddler? The way I see it, there’s really only one way to go, and that is to re-cast the Joker. That may seem sacreligious after what Ledger has done with the character, but hey, the show must go on. There have been six James Bonds, Three Jack Ryans, and five Batmans, so there’s absolutely no reason why there can’t be a fourth Joker.

Tom Cruise wants to make a comic book movie. Wonderful. I’m sure this project will feature absolutely no Scientology propaganda.

It looks like the Voltron movie has some new financiers and may be close to being green-lit for production. Apparently it won’t be a huge-budget production like Michael Bay’s Transformers, but rather a moderately-priced feature with lots of green screen effects ala 300 and Sin City. Hmmm, so are we going to get a shirtless Keith screaming, “Madness? THIS. IS. ARUS!!!!” ?

Bad news for Superman movie fans: it looks like the proposed sequel, The Man of Steel is in a “holding pattern” over at Warner Brothers, until studio executives “figure out what to do with the property next”. Translation: “We need to hire someone who won’t make Superman an effeminate, whiny, jealous super-stalker. Oh, and also the movie was a giant, smelly turd.”

Here’s a really cool article about the making of the 1980 film, Flash Gordon. God, I love that movie. The highlight of the piece is Brian Blessed (the guy who played the Hawkman leader, Vultan), talking about how he would laugh and chase midgets around the set. Awesome.

Last but not least, here’s an awesome and hilarious blog called Springfield Punx, which features all manner of superheroes, sci-fi characters, and other random pop culture figures rendered Simpsons-style.